Launch Complex 36 (LC-36)—formerly known as Space Launch Complex 36 (SLC-36) from 1997 to 2010—is a launch complex at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Brevard County, Florida. It was used for Atlas launches by NASA and the U.S. Air Force from 1962 until 2005. Blue Origin has leased the launch site since 2015 in order to build a new launch site for launching the company's orbital rockets. Orbital launches are expected to begin from LC-36 no earlier than Q4 2022, and the first launch vehicle slated to launch there is New Glenn, under development by Blue Origin since 2012. As of 2019, LC-36 is under major construction, including for a large launch pad for the launch vehicle with nearby Horizontal Integration Facility, lightning tower, water tower, and propellant tank farm for liquid methane and liquid oxygen. Historically, the complex consisted of two launch pads, SLC-36A and SLC-36B, and was the launch site for the Pioneer, Surveyor, and Mariner probes in the 1960s and 1970s. There were a total of 145 launches from LC 36 during the period that the US government operated the launch complex in the first five decades of spaceflight. The Atlas rockets launched from Complex 36 were subsequently superseded by the Atlas V launch vehicle which launches from Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral beginning in 2002. History LC-36 was originally constructed by the US government in the early 1960s in order to launch the Atlas-Centaur rocket, with first launch in May 1962. LC-36A was the scene of the biggest on-pad explosion in Cape history when Atlas-Centaur AC-5 fell back onto the pad on March 2, 1965. The accident spurred NASA to complete work on LC-36B which had been abandoned when it was 90% finished. LC-36B was built near LC-36A "due to the Atlas-Centaur’s increasing flight rate – and low reliability early on." The pad was modified during the late 1980s to be able to launch the Atlas I, with first launch occurring in July 1990, and was subsequently modified two additional times during the 1990s to launch the Atlas II and Atlas III launch vehicles. Atlas III made its sixth and final launch from LC-36 in 2005. There were a total of 68 and 77 launches from pads 36A and 36B, respectively, while the US government operated the launch complex in the first five decades of spaceflight. Interregnum The pad was unused from mid-2005 through 2015.